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Audio Description
Yuhe Zhang
Yuhe Zhang is a set designer who graduated with a BA from Wimbledon College of Arts. Her creative practice is active across Beijing, Shanghai, and London. She has worked on a wide range of theatrical productions, from musicals and plays to immersive theatre, with a particular focus on diverse styles and varying scales of performance. Though still in the early stages of her career, she approaches every project with curiosity, dedication, and a strong passion for learning.
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Antigone
Speculative design for London Coliseum
2025
This speculative project reimagines Antigone within the cultural context of the Yi ethnic minority in China. Drawing from the original tragedy’s themes of resistance, female agency, and moral conflict, the work situates the narrative in a traditional Yi tribe governed by strict religious customs.
In this adaptation, the tribal leader—paralleling King Creon—condemns Polyneices as a sinner for damaging the sacred Masang tree, a symbol of ancestral lineage in
Yi culture. Antigone becomes a young Yi woman influenced by modern ideas, who defies the tribal authority to honour and bury her brother. Her act challenges both ancestral taboos and gender inequality, transforming the classic struggle between state power and personal conviction into a confrontation between tradition and emerging female autonomy.
Through this reinterpretation, the piece examines blind faith, patriarchal norms, and the tensions between cultural heritage and progressive values.
Passing Strange
• Music: Stew and Heidi Rodewald
• Lyrics: Stew
Speculative design for Lyric Theatre Hammersmith
2023
This project is based on the musical Passing Strange, which follows a young Black man’s search for identity across Los Angeles, Amsterdam, and Berlin. Leaving
his structured upbringing and church community, he embraces artistic freedom abroad, only to discover that self-reinvention and rebellion cannot replace genuine
emotional connection at home.
To reflect the work’s rapid transitions and shifting emotional landscapes, the design rejects literal street settings. Instead, modular box structures made from varied materials express the distinct character of each city, supported by small symbolic props. This abstract approach prioritises psychological experience over physical realism, enabling fluid scene changes whilst tracing the protagonist’s inner transformation.
Metamorphosis
Speculative design for Dorfman Theatre
This design is based on Metamorphosis, Lemn Sissay’s physical theatre adaptation of Franz Kafka’s classic tale. The story follows Gregor Samsa, a travelling salesman who wakes one morning to find himself transformed into an insect. As his physical condition worsens, his family’s fear and rejection grow, revealing the fragility of human empathy and the suffocating pressures of domestic life.
The design explores Gregor’s loneliness and emotional suffocation within his family. His room is physically separated from the communal space to emphasise disconnection, positioned closer to the audience to evoke intimacy and draw viewers into his inner world. The distant placement of the family area heightens the sense of alienation, making their actions appear unreachable and uncontrollable. Through this spatial contrast, the design translates psychological tension into physical form.
A Journey to the West
by Ziqi Lin
Central Saint Martin White Lab and Camden Fringe
•Directed by: Yi Tang and Haonan Wang
•Produced by: Ruoyang Xu, Sunny Liu, Jing He
•Make-up: Haiyao Fu, Jingmeng Dou
•Music Design: Hao Liu
•Sichuan opera director: Zhijie Zhang
•Stage Manager: Hongrui Yao
•Set Design Assistant: Jiaru Jiang, Hanning Zhang
•Lighting Design: Xiaoran Luo, Yang Tang
•Costume Design: Yumu Lin
•Prop design: Wenyan Liu
This original experimental play depicts a Generation Z international student’s psychological odyssey, caught between parental devotion — encapsulated in the phrase “for your own good” — and the pursuit of self-identity. The narrative explores the emotional and cultural tensions faced by young people navigating between expectation and independence.
The stage design presents an installation of multiple doors, symbolising the life paths and choices that define personal growth. Puzzle-shaped tracks — monochrome on one side and colourful on the other — express transformation and uncertainty, suggesting that even when plans change, life can still unfold in vibrant and unexpected ways.
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